Cold Case

3

“The Callivant Callivants?” Matt asked numbly. Of course he knew the name. The Callivants were one of America’s great political dynasties, up there with the Tafts of Ohio and the Kennedys of Massachusetts.

Like the Tafts and Kennedys, the Callivants had given the nation senators and congressmen. Unlike those other dynasties, the Callivants had never succeeded in reaching the White House. Steve Callivant, the candidate the family had been grooming, had died in the Gulf War. His brother Will, a decorated veteran, had entered presidential primaries — and perished when his campaign bus overturned. The youngest brother, Martin, made a stab at the next presidential election cycle — only to have his bid cut short by a terrorist bomb.

The politics of tragedy seemed to dog the Callivants. Attempting to hide the effects of a stroke, Senator Walter Callivant had tried the experimental Patel Procedure. The controversial treatment had failed disastrously, leaving the senator wheelchair-bound. Riding on a wave of sympathy both for the senator and over Martin’s assassination, Walter’s son, Walter G. Callivant, had moved into his father’s Senate seat.

Matt had been aware of some of the media coverage there. Walter G. had turned out to be a patch of low comedy in the family tapestry. Although he tried to distinguish himself with the middle initial, people always called him Junior — or worse, Callivant Lite. He’d ended up a one-term wonder after six years of providing all too much material for the late-night comics.

Still, the Callivants came and went to their compound on the outskirts of Wilmington, pulling strings in Delaware’s state capital, Dover…and also in Washington. A new generation of Callivant cousins had provided a couple of promising young congressmen.

Callivants were always generous with their celebrity for charitable causes — the more glittering the party, the better. They could be depended upon to attend society shindigs, and always, always for political performances — especially ones commemorating the family’s honored dead.

How could a Callivant have been involved in the death of this girl — what was her name? Priscilla Hadding?

When Matt asked, Leif gave him another shrug. “As the cops say, she was last seen in the company of Walter G. Callivant.”

“The senator?” Matt couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“His election was well off in the future at that time,” Leif explained. “We’re talking early 1980s, here. Walter G. was busy squeaking through prep school with a gentleman’s C average. Silly — that, by the way, was Priscilla’s personal choice for a nickname — was debating whether to spend her senior year abroad.”

“So they were just about our age when this happened.” To Matt, the story seemed weirder and weirder.

“Yep. The night Priscilla Hadding disappeared, there was a big end-of-school party. Half the rich kids from Delaware, Maryland, Virginia — and D.C. — put in an appearance. It was on the back forty of somebody’s estate. There was a big bonfire, lots of kids paired off, and apparently, people brought in lots of refreshments.” Leif’s face twisted. “I’ve been to parties like that. ‘Party’ is putting it very politely. ‘Drunken brawl’ might come closer. If Silly Hadding was last seen with Walter G., depend on it that the eyewitnesses had pretty blurry vision. Anyway, according to the papers of the day, the witnesses disagreed on the time, the place, and how the two kids were getting along. Conspiracy theorists like to think it was a smoke screen engineered by the all-powerful Callivant family.”

Leif laughed. “Others think it’s just another campaign in the secret war against the Callivants. The Invisible Masters of Evil killed Will and Martin, crippled Walter Senior, and tried to smear Walter G.”

“And what do you think?” Matt asked.

“I don’t like either extreme. Enough strange, sad, and stupid things happen to any family over generations. When the family is famous, the media tends to play up those events. On the other hand, rich families can afford the kind of lawyers who lay down a smoke screen as a matter of course. And a lot of police forces aren’t exactly gung-ho about investigating prominent pillars of the local community.”

“What did Walter G. have to say?”

“When the cops finally talked to him — he was in a private hospital for shock or a hangover or something — Walter G. wasn’t very helpful. He said he and Silly made out a little — they were a semicouple, as I recall — then they split up, and young master Callivant drove home.”

“He didn’t take Silly — the girl — home first?” Matt felt silly, using that upper-crust nickname. And he couldn’t believe that any boy would leave a girl stranded at a party, no matter how ritzy.

“Apparently, she wanted to stay.” Leif turned to his friend with an odd expression on his face. “You’ve never been to that kind of party — and you should probably be glad. The rich really are different, in one way especially. They’re very fond of getting their own way. The two kids may have had an argument, and one or the other went storming off. It could even have happened the way young Callivant told it. The girl could have dismissed him. ‘Run along, now. I’ve got other fish to fry.’”

“You make it sound—so unpleasant,” Matt couldn’t help saying.

“I told you,” Leif said, his mocking smile completely gone. “Being rich is no bowl of cherries.”

He lounged back on his uncomfortable-looking seat. “So, now that you’ve gotten some of the gory details — and a whole lot of conjecture — what are you going to do with the information?”

Now it was Matt’s turn to shrug. “I have no idea,” he confessed. He held up his hand. “No. One thing I do know. I won’t be detecting very much in that sim, unless the player who’s been snooping around confesses to Ed Saunders.”

“I hope you’re not holding your breath on that possibility,” Leif told him. “Otherwise, you’ll end up looking like this.” He frowned for a moment in thought, then his face turned bright blue. It was one of the joys of being on the Net — virtual special effects on command.

“You don’t think the hacking will stop?” Matt asked.

“Oh, it may stop,” Leif replied. “But I can’t see anyone admitting to it. After seeing what happened to your pal Saunders, do you think these guys are going to nominate themselves as targets for the Callivant lawyers’ brigade?”

Leif had almost forgotten Matt’s visit as he wrestled with the intricacies of tying a black silk bow tie. The Delmarva Club was strictly old-fashioned. Formal events meant black tie and tuxedo — even if it was an event for the “young people.”

Looking in his mirror, Leif had to smile. He looked good in a monkey suit — although, he also had to admit, that was true enough for most males. His formal suit had been hand-tailored to make the most of his slim frame, and the red hair above his slightly sharp features glowed like a flame. The effect was that of a very well-dressed fox.

Leif bared his teeth at his reflection as the internal phone system sounded. It was the doorman, reporting that his ride had arrived.

Arriving downstairs from the penthouse, Leif stood for a second in disbelief. His pal Charlie Dysart had gone all-out for tonight’s little excursion. The car was a classic, a beautiful vintage Dodge gleaming as if it had just come out of the showroom.

“Charlie, you’ve definitely outdone yourself,” Leif said, shaking his head. “I know your dad collects cars, but how did you—”

“What Father doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” replied young Dysart, in a rig even more resplendent than Leif’s. His dark hair was slicked back in the manner of some long-forgotten flatfilm personality. “At least it won’t hurt until he happens to check the odometer on this baby.”

The trip from Washington to the Wilmington suburb of Haddington was about ninety miles. Yeah, that would put a sizable change on the mint car’s mileage.

Leif got in. “By the way,” Charlie said as they pulled away, “did I mention that you’re paying for the gas?”

The winding country road made for a welcome relief from the interstate, where Charlie Dysart had done everything but play bumper cars with his father’s valuable collector’s item. Leif hoped he hadn’t sweat through his tux.

The Dysarts were an old-money family who had invested well. Their family fortune had recently enlarged nicely, thanks to Leif’s father. They spent their time on charity, hobbies, counting their money, and — in Charlie’s case — being outrageous.

That was part of the reason Charlie’d invited Leif along for this road trip. The Delmarva Club was a fortress for the old, privileged families of Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, as the club name suggested. Members’ families were expected to have fought prominently at least in the Civil War, if not in the Revolution. It was not a place where the firstborn son of an immigrant billionaire would be warmly welcomed.

Before his exciting ride, Leif had expected the evening to be deadly dull. Still, if Charlie wanted to rile the old-line members, the least Leif could do was go along with the plan.

Charlie had finally slowed down on the pitch-black country lane. Leif could barely make out the fieldstone wall to one side. Then, suddenly, he spotted light ahead, streaming through a pair of open iron gates. Charlie piloted the Dodge into a turn.

Gravel crunched under their wheels as they moved toward a pillared house that would have made a perfect set for a Civil War movie. They swept round a circular drive, where Charlie turned the car over to a valet parking attendent.

A moment later, they were inside the house, and sober-faced servants removed their overcoats as Charlie produced his invitation. Then they were heading into a ballroom.

The glittering crystal chandeliers were from another age, contrasting with the slightly shabby carpeting — typical of any WASP enclave — and the sedate clothing of the Delmarva Club’s younger generation.

There was a band that managed to make any music it played seem twenty years older than it really was. And through some subtle magic — Leif’s father called it “the cursed Society Beat”—there was no way to dance to the tunes.

The refreshments were, in finest Anglo-Saxon tradition, tasteless and also nonalcoholic. Leif was sure there was some spot outside, away from the eyes of the chaperones, where discreet hip flasks appeared.

Those chaperones, by the way, were congregated against the rear wall of the large room, looking about as bored as Leif felt — except for one older woman. She stood ramrod stiff, her short white hair in striking contrast to the black dress she wore. Her eyes seemed to glitter as she greedily took in the sight of the dancing teenagers.

Charlie Dysart followed Leif’s gaze. “Creepy, huh? That’s old Felicia Hadding. The town’s named after her family. For more than forty years, they tell me, she’s turned up at every youth party. Always the same. Dressed in black, and ready to jump on anyone who does anything out of line.”

Leif stood very still as a couple of other facts came swimming up from his memory — bits of the long-ago case that he hadn’t told Matt. Priscilla Hadding had died on a back-country road in the society hamlet of Haddington, Delaware. And her mother had been a widow named Felicia Hadding.

“Any reason for that?” Leif asked through suddenly dry lips.

Charlie shrugged. “She lost her pride and joy in some accident after a party. I don’t know why she doesn’t join one of those groups against drunk drivers instead of ruining everyone’s fun.”

“Maybe she wouldn’t like the publicity,” Leif said. Old-line society types felt the only times their name should appear in the papers were when they were born, when they were married, and when they died.

He paused, hit by a sudden notion. Matt automatically assumed — and so had he — that the cease-and-desist letters came from the Callivants. What if those lawyers were instead working for Felicia Hadding? Maybe she didn’t want anyone nosing around in the facts about her daughter’s death.

“Whoa!” Charlie Dysart’s boisterous comment cut through Leif’s thoughts. “Looks like we get to party with the rich and famous tonight! That’s Nikki Callivant coming off the dance floor.”

Talk about your coincidences, Leif thought. After talking about that old case with Matt, I come to Haddington and meet a Callivant.

On second thought, it might not be such a big coincidence after all. The Callivant compound wasn’t all that far from Haddington. And this was probably the sort of society affair that the young Callivants were encouraged to attend.

He knew the name Nicola Callivant. She was Walter G.’s granddaughter, about the same age as Leif and Matt. Either she wasn’t interested or wasn’t old enough for the splashier affairs attended by her older cousins. Somehow, she’d managed to keep away from the lenses of the press and HoloNews.

The few pictures Leif had seen of her made Nicola look fragile, like an overly nervous thoroughbred horse. In holos her features seemed too delicate, her expression too refined.

The word you’re looking for, Leif told himself, is effete.

Seeing Nikki in real life changed that impression. Yes, her face was delicate, more delicate even than portraits of her mother, a famed beauty. Her hair was light brown and fine, floating like a cloud around her face. But those deep blue, almost violet, eyes were far from delicate. They glittered with pride, and with intelligence Leif could feel even halfway across the room.

Without even discussing it, Leif and Charlie began heading toward the girl. Nicola gave the guy she’d been dancing with a cool smile and began turning away.

“Hey! Nikki!” Charlie Dysart called, grabbing Leif by the arm. “I didn’t think you’d be out slumming tonight.”

Nikki Callivant’s lips retained the same smile, but Leif noticed a brief flicker in her eyes. He recognized the look. Sometimes it passed between his Net Force friends when Andy Moore got a little too boisterous.

“Hello, Dysart,” she said, her voice flat.

“I want you to meet a friend of mine,” Charlie said, drowning out her words. “Leif, say hello to Nikki.”

Dysart’s crude introduction left Leif no choice. He’d just have to make the best of an embarrassing situation. “Ms. Callivant, how do you do. I’m Leif Anderson—”

Those incredible eyes suddenly went cold. “I’ve heard about you, Anderson.”

Leif almost physically stumbled. “Excuse me?” You’d think he’d broken wind instead of trying to break the ice.

“You pestered a friend of mine,” Nicola Callivant spoke remorselessly on. “Forced your company on her. Embarrassed her. Do you speak French, Mr. Anderson? Maybe you’ll understand a few of the words she had to say about you. Parvenu. Arriviste.”

As she spoke, Leif couldn’t help noticing the fine-boned sculpting of Nikki Callivant’s nose — even though she was looking down it at him.

“Déclassé,” she finally concluded her insulting list.

Leif’s French was impeccable, better than hers was if the accent was anything to go by. He understood each painful word. Social climber. Upstart. Lower class.

“So who had all these nice things to say about me?” he asked in a carefully level tone of voice.

Nikki Callivant’s right eyebrow rose in a perfect arch. “Is it a hobby of yours? Are there so many women who might say such things that you can’t guess? Do you push yourself on every woman you meet?”

“It’s an exercise in masochism.”

The girl’s lips twisted in disgust. “A friend of mine from New York. Courtney Hardaway.”

Leif spread his hands. “Well, there you go. Courtney did have to put up with me. Just as I had to put up with her. We were forced together by my parents — and by hers. Hardaway Industries was getting a big cash transfusion from my dad’s company.” He made a modest, waving-away gesture. “Yes, I know. Crude. New money. Not like yours. But then, my father had certain handicaps. His family was busy being oppressed while your family was busily war profiteering during World War Two.”

Beside him, Leif heard Charlie Dysart make a noise somewhere between a gasp and a gulp.

Nicola Callivant showed her breeding, however. First, her perfect face went pale as marble. Then her cheeks burned bright red. “How dare you!” she grated. “I am a Callivant!”

“And I’m an Anderson,” Leif replied. “Thanks for teaching me an important lesson. I wouldn’t have believed it. But there are worse snobs on this earth than Courtney Hardaway.”

Spinning on his heel, he stalked away.